


After all, we are all the same

by isabellatn



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-09
Updated: 2015-03-09
Packaged: 2018-03-17 01:11:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,899
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3509600
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/isabellatn/pseuds/isabellatn
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's funny how you look back on life and think, "If I had only known back then that I had a year left." </p><p> </p><p>or, as Sirius falls through the veil, he sees his life flash by.</p>
            </blockquote>





	After all, we are all the same

As Sirius falls, he remembers thinking  _this cannot be my end._  

He briefly sees Harry look at him with wide eyes and gasping for breath. Sirius wants to say goodbye, or whatever word imaginable, but finds himself unable to. He has a lump in his throat, and he realizes that no words would have sufficed for the sadness that he will bring upon his godson. 

Sirius expects pain when he meets the floor, but he never feels it. He looks around him, everything is a light grey. However, he is alone, with nothing but a great wooden door at the other end of the enormous space he finds himself in. He begins walking and notes there is a weightless feeling in his movements. He is much more quicker, and so he reaches the door handle in mere seconds. 

He grips the door open and immediately shields his face. A bright light blinds him. Sirius can't help but smirk, _follow the light indeed._ He peeks through his fingers and finds the light has diminished somewhat. He walks down the three steps before him and suddenly he feels a great pain in his chest. He feels as if someone had his hand in there, crushing his heart, and beating his lungs. Sirius falls down to his knees, he is sure that now he will truly die, that the gray room was only an antechamber to his early death. 

As quickly as the pain surged up, it disappears. It leaves Sirius dazed and confused. He is still coughing when he notices the change in scenery. 

The crispness in the air reminds him of autumn in Hogwarts, and as he takes note of the trees around Sirius hopes that maybe this is a slideshow of his finest moments in his life, a last true celebration of who he was. He is wrong. It shows all those moments he wished he had changed, the moments where he was most ashamed on who he was. Unaware, he quickly begins to find his way out of the Forbidden Forest and toward his friends. Most of all, he wishes to see James, for he was the person he longed most for. He did not even think about the traitor Pettigrew, for he was sure that such a vile human being would not have place in his best memories. Maybe Moony would show up as well, but then again, maybe not, he wasn't dead, and Sirius really hoped that he wouldn't have to meet him in a long time. 

He finally arrives by Hagrid's Hut, unsurprisingly he is not there, he is still alive. Sirius begins the trek up to the castle and sees people on the grounds with their friends chatting, just as they would in the living world. He bitterly notices some of them are young, it seems war truly escapes no one. He doesn't quite recognize them, but Sirius feels as if he has seen them before. He decides to leave them be and head inside. There are a few people inside, they all look like students age-wise. Not only that but Sirius knows them to be his classmates when he was at school. He can hardly believe quite as much people from his Hogwart's years have already died. They look at him with pity, some with contempt, of course they are Slytherins. 

He enters the Great Hall and looks to the Gryffindor table. No James in sight. Sirius approaches the table, just to make sure. He notices dark read hair and knows without a doubt that it belongs to Lily. Sirius quickens his pace and when he reaches her he grips her shoulders and twists her around. Lily yelps in surprise and automatically frowns in annoyance, but as soon as she realizes who is doing this her eyes well up with tears. Lily hugs him just as she always did when she was alive and they were finally friends. She holds him as tight as when they found out Reg died, and as fondly as when they graduated and knew that their lives were barely starting.

"Lils, I've missed you so much." And Sirius can't help but hug her as tightly. He lets go and sees her exactly the way she looked in their sixth year. He briefly wonders if he does as well. Apparently Lily notices his confusion.

"We take the age we were in our memories, Sirius." She frowns slightly. "Why are you here?" 

"I'm dead, I thought you knew." Lily huffs in exasperation and asks, "I mean how, you tosser. What happened? While I am in your memories I only know of my death, alongside James'."

"So you don't know anything? Nothing about Harry, a-about what happened to me?"

The sadness in Lily's eyes are palpable. "No, not while I am in your memories, when you finish them, and only then, you will meet the fully aware me. Now tell me everything, please."

"I fell through the Veil of Death in the Department of Mysteries." Now that Sirius heard it like that, he has to admit that it was a really stupid way to go. At least he was protecting Harry and the others. 

"What? What the hell where you doing there in the first place?! And what about Harry?! Please, tell me he is okay." Lily was near tears once again, he had forgotten how sensible she was. 

"It's kind of a long story, and frankly, what's the point in telling you if you are not even 'real you'?" As expected, Lily smacked his should quite hard. "Fine! I was battling Death Eaters. By the way, I am thirty six years old," At this Lily looks at him with pity. "I know, young. But you were younger, so." Sirius grimaced. "Harry is fine. He looks like James, but with your eyes. He is kind and generous, and has quite the temper like his old mum." Lily gently elbows him in the ribs while smiling to herself. "Although he can be just as mischievous as James ever was. Oh, and he is always getting into trouble, although not of his own doing. He is loyal to his friends, a true Gryffindor. Too much of a Gryffindor, I would say." Sirius frowns slightly and gets lost in thought. 

He feels Lily's gently nudge and looks up to her. "We will see again, Sirius. Right now you have to look for James and relive your memory. Thank you for telling me about Harry." She hugs him fiercely once again. "I am so happy to see you again, although it is sooner than I would've hoped."

* * *

 He arrives to the Common Room, somehow knowing that James will be there. He finds him seated by the fire, on his favorite armchair. As he approaches him, the atmosphere changes. It is not morning anymore, and as he glances toward the windows, he sees it's dark outside. There are suddenly a lot of people around him. It looked as the Common Room would normally look. He realizes he has walked into his memory and wonders what it could possibly be, so far he does not recognize it.

"James! Mate-" Sirius is suddenly stopped by the glare he is receiving by the boy in question. James and he hardly ever fought, unless- Realization dawned upon him, and he quickly gathered the memories he would remember were not going to be good ones. 

"What the bloody hell were you thinking? How dare you take advantage of what Moony is for your own amusement." Sirius gaped just as he did in 1976. "You are lucky Snape is not dead!" 

"I-" James looks around and heads toward their room. Sirius follows, feeling the shame he felt back then, only now it is multiplied. How did Remus ever forgive him? James continues screaming at him when they reach the dorm. 

"Remus could have been expelled. Snape knows now. What the hell, Sirius?" James sits down and covers his face in his hands in frustration. All Sirius has left to feel is confusion, why did he get to talk to Lily normally, but not to James? Why couldn't he get out of this memory?

"You are just like them, taking pleasure from the pain in others. You really can't escape your family, can't you, Sirius?" 

The memory ends and he feels like he has been punched in the gut. He knows James regretted his harsh words but it was something that resonated with Sirius throughout his life. He can't help but agree with James. 

* * *

 The memory changes but he is still at Hogwarts. There is not many people around so he figures the memory has not started quite yet. He starts looking for James once again, but he is nowhere to be found. Lily is still in the Great Hall so he approaches her. 

"You didn't tell me the memories would be awful." Sirius slouched next to Lily and she smiled sadly at him. 

"I'm sorry, but everyone has to go through it. What number is this one?" Lily asks.

"Second. I want it to be over already."

"Most people have up to five really bad memories, so at most, you only have four more." Sirius glares at her. 

"Where is James? I have only seen him in my actual memory, and he was kinda pissed at me." 

"If you haven't seen him by now then you'll have to wait until after you finish your memories." Sirius frowns in puzzlement.

"Why?" Lily shrugs and says, "I don't know, every dead person has that one person they can't see until the very end." 

Sirius lets out a humorless laugh. "Just my luck, I guess." He stands up, says goodbye and as he pries open the doors to Great Hall he is swept into the next memory. 

With a chuckle he realizes it is the day of his graduation. He is with James and his parents. Sirius isn't quite listening to them, there's white noise in his ears. He wonders why this is a bad memory. He feels happy, he has just graduated, he's alongside his best mate in the whole wide world and his parents which are the best parents one could wish for. Many a time he had envied James for how he was raised, and the unconditional love he has always felt from his parents. He remember why this is a bad memory.

In that moment he notices that his mum and dad aren't there. They didn't not feel the need to attend the graduation of his eldest. For a moment he wishes to be just like all the other Slytherins and mindlessly follow whatever they are told to do. To be like Reg and know that his parents are proud of him. He wishes not to be so morally good and for him to be easy to hate muggleborns. 

For that he feels deeply ashamed, and even more so, because at times whenever it gets rough, he finds himself dreaming the same dream. 

* * *

 Sirius does not know that this is his last memory but he has an inkling of what it is. 

He feels tired, drained and when he opens his eyes he is not surprised that he is no longer in Hogwarts. However, he is surprised by the setting. It appears he is in a cave and there is no one around. This time around, he goes straight to the memory instead of talking to the memory. Sirius is confused, he has never been here, this could not possibly be a memory. He sees a light at the end, and two figures silhouetted, one much more smaller than the other. Sirius carefully begins approaching them. 

As he keeps on walking, he suddenly feels his shoe become drenched. He has step into water. Having become a little more adjusted to the lack of light this far away from the figures, he notices a lake separates them. Sirius figures that he will swim, and so he steps further in the water. About halfway to the other end he feels something briefly touch his ankle, and just as quickly it lets go. He decides to forget about it,  _I am dead anyway, what's it gonna do?_ He steps out of the water and can clearly see Regulus and Kreacher as the two figures. They are leaning over a basin and Regulus is tucking a scrap of parchment into a locket. 

Sirius comes closer to them and realizes they can't see him, for this is not really a place he has been in therefore, he has no way of being visible. 

"Kreacher, I will drink the water, you have to make me drink, don't stop me. You have to make me finish it. As soon as I am done leave-"

"But Master Regulus,-" Kreacher, Sirius notes, has never looked as desperate as he looks now.  _What kind of Dark Magic are they doing? I should have expected it from Regulus,_  thought Sirius bitterly. 

"I have to do this Kreacher, you are tell absolutely no one of how I died." Sirius realizes he is remembering the time when he found out Regulus died. However, he never found out what exactly happened to him.

"Master-" Kreacher was now crying.

"You will take this locket and destroy it. This is to be my last order to you, and I hope you carry it out." Reg smiles grimly at him and Sirius is wondering what will happen with growing fear. He knows how it ends, but somehow he still hopes. 

"Yes, Master." With that, Regulus begins drinking the water. It appears to hurt him. He takes a while to take a second drink. At this he falls to the floor. Sirius crouches next to him and holds his face. "What is going on?" But the question falls on deaf ears. 

Regulus begins moaning unintelligible words. Kreacher approaches him with another drink, but Regulus fights it. "I'm so-. I'm so sorr-."

"What? What are you trying to say Reg?" Sirius asks desperately. 

Regulus takes another drink, while Kreacher keeps on repeating, "Only one more, Master. Only one more." 

"Sirius..." For a moment Sirius thinks Regulus can see him. "'m sorry, so sorry." 

Regulus keeps on moaning until he finishes the whole basin. "Go!" He tells Kreacher. 

Kreacher hesitates but obediently he leaves in the little boat. Regulus crawls to the basin and leaves the locket at the bottom of the basin. He is gasping for breath and keeps on saying "water, water." He reaches the lake to drink from it, and as he is satiating his thirst a hand grips his and pulls him towards the water. Reg tries to fight it, but dozens of other hands do the same as the first. Sirius is trying to help him, but as he tries to pull hims towards himself Reg only goes the opposite way. He realizes the hands belong to Inferi, and helplessly he looks as his little brother is dragged away.

Sirius is surprised to find tears on his face. He wonders what the hell they were doing and heads towards the basin. It's filled again but he reaches into it and takes the locket. Sirius opens it an within he finds the parchment Regulus was writing on. 

Suddenly he understands why he is there, and why it is not exactly a memory. Reg died betraying Voldemort. He died because he wanted to destroy the horcrux. Sirius always thought that he has been killed because he got in too deep and was scared of what he found. His worst memory is giving up on his own brother, and accusing him as his own family did to Sirius. 

His worst memory is not being able to help, to hear his name being called for help, and he not knowing, not only that, but thinking the worst of his own blood. 

"I'm so sorry, Reg. Forgive me."

* * *

 He is lying on the floor. His motorcycle is next to him, as is James and Lily. He looks at their sad smiles and quickly hugs them with all his strength. 

"You just had to fall, didn't you?" James says with a grin that Sirius had missed for fourteen years. 

"Shut up, mate. I died a hero." He smirks. Lily rolls her eyes while James just smiles.

"Are you ready to go then?" James asks.

"Go where?"

"On." Lily replies mysteriously while James laughs.

"But how?" 

"Get on your bike and ride." 

"James, did you just quote Queen?" 

"It  **is** a bloody great band, and it seemed fitting." 

Sirius takes one last look at his best mate and his wife. He heads over to his motorcycles and hops on it.

"Do I just go on straight?" But they have already left. So Sirius does just that.  

* * *

It's funny how you look back on life an think, "If I had only known back then that I had a year left." A year before I had this massive row with my friends. A year before I realized something deeply shameful. A year before my brother died. A year before I died. 

It seems as if our life isn't really our, as if it's time's. As if we are only passengers in this body, slave to fate, destiny, a god; who knows. 

I believe I could have died a year later, or a decade later and I still would have thought, "This cannot be my end." 

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first fanfiction ever! I hope you enjoyed it and please review to let me know what you thought!


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